


Red Handed

by janetcarter



Series: The Greatest Adventure [2]
Category: Babylon 5
Genre: F/M, Post-Series, Pregnancy, Trust Issues, Unplanned Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-05
Updated: 2020-06-05
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:47:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,260
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24561829
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/janetcarter/pseuds/janetcarter
Summary: Lyta thinks G'Kar knocked her up on purpose. After all, it would've been an easy way to get telepathic Narns, right? But shockingly, not everyone is always secretly plotting for their own self interest.
Relationships: Lyta Alexander/G'Kar
Series: The Greatest Adventure [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1740013
Comments: 2
Kudos: 13





	Red Handed

**Author's Note:**

> For the Bad Things Happen Bingo prompt "Trust Issues."

"Was this your plan all along?" she finally asks him. She feels sick as she presses her hand against her stomach, but it's a nausea different than morning sickness. She'd know, after all, considering how familiar she'd grown with the latter as of late.

He doesn't even look up at her from the kitchen booth, and she can't say she blames him after her other outbursts lately. But this is different, so the least he could do is quit scribbling his pen across the page and fess up.

"If you want your question answered," he starts, using a voice so calm he might as well be flicking a match into pool of fuel. "You would benefit from first telling me what it is I am being accused of."

"Don't…" She takes deep breath before pinching the bridge of her nose. "Don't play stupid. You said you weren't taking me along to keep my DNA close, but it was such an obvious lie."

One she almost let herself believe.

He _finally_ sets the pen down and squints at her. "Lyta, if even you did not realize this could happen… How could I have known?"

"A lucky guess." An _extremely_ lucky guess, one given weight by the fact taking her along was insurance on their deal either way. "And you only got close to me to see if you were right. Anything for your people… I know how it is."

He looks disappointed, and she thinks she can even feel the same emotion weighing down the air. If she does, it's got to be disappointment over the fact his lie is meeting its end.

"After everything we have been through," he says slowly **,** probably pausing to evoke whatever pleasant memories they might share--as if they aren't all tainted now. "You still do not trust me?"

"How can I? I mean, look at me." She gestures down to her abdomen. Her pregnancy was only showing if you knew to look, but it gets the message across well enough. "You got exactly what you wanted."

"What I _wanted_ was a travelling companion. Yes, this is an amazing development, however… it was just as surprising to me as it was to you." He taps the concave surface of his temple twice, reminding her of her own fingertips stroking same skin's ridges. "You can see for yourself, if you would like."

He always offered that when she doubted him. The fact he even pretended she'd stoop that low was proof enough of his bullshit. "You know I can't."

"Because of your values?" He sighs and lowers his hand, continuing on in that infuriatingly calm voice. "Or because you are afraid of what you may find?"

"I'm not scared of something I already know!" She could've easily hid from the truth, but she didn't. She confronted it--confronted _him_ \--for using her just like everyone else did. She just thought this moment would feel a lot more freeing, but beneath her twisted pride sits something hollow.

"Fine, then. Look! Get confirmation on what it is you think you know. I won't stop you--not that I could."

He has to be bluffing. It's the only trick anyone stupid enough to lie to a telepath has. She's not going to do it, though. She's going to hear it directly from him.

"You know," she scoffs, confident that he's about to break. "You still haven't told me what your government thinks of all this."

His features slacken. His lips part. "That is because I did not tell them."

"What?"

"They do not know, Lyta." His tone sounds so broken--betrayed, maybe, which is ironic given how _she_ feels. "Did you really think…?"

"But…" She shakes her head. This is all wrong. "Why not?"

"I do not want them turning our child into an experiment, especially not after… what it did to you."

Her heart practically stops at his admission. She lets herself fall into the booth beside him, resting her head against his shoulder. He listened to everything she'd said back before they even...

Fuck. "I'm sorry."

She feels him turn his head toward her. "When are you going to trust me?"

"It's not that I don't want to."

"And yet you never read my thoughts."

"It's an invasion of privacy."

"Rather, it's confirmation on what you don't want to accept."

"What?"

"It is easier to lose yourself in your darkest thoughts, is it not? To dare accept that you are loved means opening yourself to a whole new horde of struggles. It means letting go of all the shields you worked so hard to build, thereby leaving yourself defenseless. It is a transitional period, and it is one you have been fighting as though your life depended on it since we stepped foot on this ship."

She clenches her teeth, but not out of anger. "Maybe my life does depend on it."

"Then I need you to know," he continues, taking her hand into his, "that I am with you through it all, as I would be even if you were not carrying my child."

"That's not--" She bites her lip to keep tears at bay. Her condition made them far too eager to show up these days, and his little psychoanalysis really, _really_ wasn't helping.

"Am I incorrect?"

"Look, I just…" She takes a deep breath. "You know getting close to people doesn't go well for me. This isn't going to last forever."

"You still deserve to enjoy its natural course."

She almost laughs. "What's there to enjoy if I'll only get hurt?"

"You act as though depriving yourself of love is not already damage enough."

She puts her head down on the table and sighs, trying to block out those last few words. "How long did you have that whole speech written?"

"Quite some time."

She's glad her head is hidden in her arms, because her lips keep wanting to smile. "You knew it wouldn't be easy when you took me on."

"And yet you still think I did it only on a gamble?"

"No, I guess not… I just wish you hadn't given me something to lose."

"The baby?"

"No--I mean… Kind of." She was still getting used to that whole… _thing._ Making emotional space for their own relationship is a battle she's still obviously trying to win. Accepting her condition--let alone _liking_ it--was in a whole other league of its own. "What I'm trying to say is I'm going to be leaving whether you like it or not. Whether _I_ like it or not."

He pauses for a moment, and she can tell he's weighing the next words carefully. "Even more reason to make the most out of the time we have."

Both of them know it won't be that simple, but he always has to have some answer for everything. She'll let him have his moment. She's put him through enough today.

When she turns her face up to look at him, he strokes her cheek. She hates how it makes her feel beneath the pools of dark, how the desire to push him away is quelled by his gentle touch, how she just sits there and admires the focus in his eyes and the quirk of his lips when he returns to his book. Most of all, she hates how he doesn't hate her back. 

She absently strokes her abdomen, hidden from his preoccupied gaze by the table.

It'd just started as sex, back then. That's what she'd told herself, anyway.

Maybe she'd been the liar all along.


End file.
